CHAPTER VI

BRYANT BECOMES A LAWYER

Always of a studious turn, always reading in his father’s well-stocked library, or wandering through the woods and writing poetry, Bryant naturally tended towards some learned profession. He did not care to be a doctor; he would have liked to be a literary man, if such a career had then existed or been dreamed possible. As it was not, he finally decided to become a lawyer.

A classmate who remembers him at this time describes him as singularly handsome and finely formed. He was tall and slender, and had a prolific growth of dark brown hair. He was also quick and dextrous in his movements, so much so that his younger brother sometimes boasted about his “stout brother,” though he afterward learned that his strength was not so remarkable as his skill and alertness in the use of it.

When his father’s poverty compelled him to abandon college, he entered the law office of a Mr. Howe, of Worthington, a quiet little village four or five miles from Cummington.

Bryant’s friend and biographer, John Bigelow, says: “A young man’s first year’s study of the law commonly affects him like his first cigar or his first experience ‘before the mast.’” In other words, Bryant didn’t like it at all. He was a conscientious young man, and kept at the work; but he felt that he would almost as soon go out as a day laborer. In a letter he speaks of Worthington as consisting of “a blacksmith shop and a cow stable,” where his only entertainment was reading Irving’s “Knickerbocker.” Mr. Howe complained that he gave more time to Wordsworth’s lyrical ballads than to Blackstone and Chitty, the great authorities on law, which he should have been studying.

Young Bryant wanted to go to Boston to continue his studies; but finally, as his father was too poor to support him in Boston, he went to Bridgewater, where his grandfather, Dr. Philip Bryant, lived. He liked this place better. He was poet for a Fourth of July celebration, and became interested in politics. The War of 1812 was going on. Madison was President, and Bryant, in his letters to his friends, speaks of him as “His Imbecility.” “His Imbecility” was warned that if he imposed any more taxes the people would revolt.

At one time, Bryant thought of entering the militia for the defense of states’ rights. It seems that he then advocated the policy of Massachusetts seceding from the Union, as the Southern states afterwards did.

His father actually got him a commission as adjutant in the Massachusetts militia, but the war ended, and Bryant kept on with his law studies. That same year he came of age and was admitted to practice at the bar.

He now went home and began to look about for a place where he could begin the practice of law. He decided on Plainfield, a small village four or five miles from Cummington. Plainfield had been the home of his father for a short time when the future poet was a child; but it was a very small place, with not more than two hundred inhabitants.

He drudged here for a few months, earning quite a little money; but he decided that the place was too small, and went to Great Barrington, where he had a chance to go into partnership with a lawyer already established, whose practice was worth $1,200 a year.

Here he settled down to hard work, and here he remained as long as he continued to practice law. After the success of “Thanatopsis,” he contributed various articles to the _North American Review_, and in it were published some of his most famous poems. He was chosen one of the tithing men of the town, and soon afterwards town clerk, an office he held for five years. As town clerk he received a salary of five dollars a year. The governor of Massachusetts also made him Justice of the Peace.

When Bryant was twenty-five years old his father died. This caused him great grief; but about this time, great happiness came to him also. Soon after going to Great Barrington he had become acquainted with a Miss Fairchild, who was an orphan visiting in the neighborhood. He liked her, and the year after his father’s death they were married. She was his devoted wife and friend for forty-five years, until she died.